Why the Mortgage Crisis Sucks

All I want to do is buy a house. Not even a big house. In fact, it could very well be smaller than my existing apartment. But the lure of the buyers credit caught my eye and I jumped through hoops for a month before I finally went to contract with 24 hours left on the credit. Of course, I had gone to contract on one place only to break the contract because the seller smokes crack but that's a story for another day. Finally, on April 29th, I went to contract on the place 4 doors down from the 1st contract and again, began the mortgage application process.

I have owned homes before. Back when the banks were bundling bad loans and blah, blah, blah. I still don't even know exactly what it is they did. But I do know, they royally screwed up and have lost all kinds of money, people are losing their houses and somehow bank executives still feel entitled to million dollar bonuses.

I have recollections of the stress of buying a house. All the documentation. The empty threats of underwriters followed by the approval of a loan you may or may not be able to afford. Well, apparently all of that has changed.

Back in 2003 when Stephen and I bought the house in Kennett, the mortgage company was more than willing to let me take on a mortgage in only my name, while Stephen provided the down payment accompanied by a short letter saying he was "gifting" me the money. Then, it was no big deal to put both of our names on the deed and go about our business. Times were good; the banks were riding high.

Seven years later, all of this is a problem. Stephen can't gift me money, even though the money is actually part out of the agreed upon buyout. This is because we were never married, therefore we were never considered blood relatives, even though we have Max. Technically, he could gift me the money but only if I go FHA and then I am required to pay 5 years of  PMI, even though I'll have put 20% down. My brother can gift me the money but they want to see his bank statements to prove to them that he has money to give me. I am pretty sure my brother doesn't want me or Bank of America to get a look inside his check book but they feel this is perfectly acceptable.

My brother does not believe me when I tell him all of this. He swears I need to just explain the situation to them and they will say "oh, okay, we misunderstood." This is not the case. So here I am still waiting to figure out what the hell I'm going to do even though I have all the money I need to buy the house. The mortgage company just wants me to have it in the way they want me to have it. Which is a problem. Because I have the money the way I have the money. I can't make me have it any other way. Does any of that make sense? If it does, can you explain it to me?